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Homemade Laundry Soap

I don’t know about you guys, but I am always looking for ways to save a buck…especially with the prices of gas and milk {not to mention, everything else} rising so steadily!

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One thing I am extremely picky about is my laundry soap. Tide is my all-time favorite, and there are a few others that I’ll tolerate if Tide isn’t an option. Unfortunately, all of you parents out there know how much laundry one little person can create. It took me a while, but I finally decided to make my own powdered laundry detergent. I will admit, I haven’t been able to duplicate the delicious scent of Tide, but I’m in love, and I don’t know that I’ll ever go back to store-bought laundry soap!

For approximately $20 and very little effort, I created a huge amount laundry soap. I would imagine this will last us at least 3-4 months. I’ll keep you updated on that!

**UPDATE: It has officially been over a year, and I am JUST now running out of soap!

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Comments

I’ve always been very interested in this, but I’m allergic to fragrances. What would you suggest for making a fragrant free soap? Would I eliminate one of these ingredients or would I just substitute it for a fragrance free version? I’m not familiar with most of these things listed so I thought I’d ask.

The only thing that really adds scent {other than the Purex Crystals – which you can easily leave out}, is the bar soap you use. The Kirk’s soap I used this go-around was pretty mild in scent – just sort of soapy. But Zote and Fels-Naptha tend to have a pretty strong scent. I’ve heard you can use any bar soap to make this, so you could just find something scent-free. And, actually, on Amazon you can get Kirk’s fragrance free!

Yes I agree!. I make mine scent free by not using the Purex Crystals and choosing fragrance free bar soap. I have also made it without the bar soap and it still works. if you want to add scent but don’t want to use chemical scents try using essential oils. I haven’t tried this but i think it would work.

For the past couple of years I’ve been making a really similar laundry soap and I love it. I leave the Purex Crystals out cuz we don’t want the scent (like your first commenter). I’m in the process right now tracking how many loads we get out of a “batch” of soap so I can compare it with pre-made laundry soap. I’m pretty sure it will be a lot less expensive. I love the big jar you have your’s in. Have a great day.

i keep seeing homemade laundry detergent and very curious to try it out for myself! glad to see its safe for HE appliances too. this seems really easy to do and a def. $$ saver! thanks for sharing – new to your site and really love all the great things you have here!! :-)

What a super idea!! I’m also addicted to Tide (and am awaiting delivery on my new HE washer – EEK!), but your reviews make me anxious to try it — only thing is… I’ve never heard of any of those bar soaps!! Can you use ANY bar soap or is that a french-milled type or something? I’ll try looking for it on Amazon, but I prefer to try and find something locally (east coast).

You should be able to find at least a few of these soaps in the cleaning/laundry aisle at your local grocery store or super center. If not, definitely on Amazon. I’ve heard you can use any bar soap, but I haven’t personally tried it.

I really need to do this for sure. We spend so much on laundry detergent :( I’d love for you to link up a few posts at my weekend link party@The Weekend re-Treat! on The Best Blog Recipes if you haven’t already!

This is the exact same recipe i use, except instead of the oxiclean, i use the “Dirty Jobs” brand of oxi booster.. which is in a green and black container (found at wal mart). its cheaper than the oxiclean, has a heavier oxi lift, and it gets my husbands oil & grease stained clothes, squeaky clean!! ive been using this for almost 2 years now, and would never go back to buying other detergent (gain was my favorite). i spend about $16 dollars every 4-5 months

This recipe looks great for the homemade laundry soap! I need to try it out. Thanks so much for sharing at Thursday’s Temptation. Your post got in the top 3 most viewed links so I am going to be featuring it at tonights link party!

Question?? I have wanted to try this for years but worry that it will not clean my clothes or get rid of the stains OR smells (from 17yr old BOY-14yr old teen and 7yr old tomboy!!!) my teens do their own laundry and they go thru a TON of soap, stain remover, bleach….I’ve never bought “expensive” laundry soaps ie Tide/Gain…I usually by Arm n Hammer with a coupon when its on sale!! So finally my question is- our family averages 12-15 loads a week in Kenmore large capacity washer. I’ve estimated that I spend at least $20/month on laundry supplies. Soap-stain remover-bleach-oxy cleaner-and softener. Is this worth the time and money? Will it really clean our clothes and cut costs? my husband lost his job in Feb of this year and I am looking for ANY way to save money-but can not afford to go spend the $$ on these ingredients that I will never use if they don’t work. I am open to ANY and ALL suggestions-opinions-options.

I haven’t had any problems with staining or smells. Though, I always add the Purex Crystals which helps a lot with the scent. This should work well for you. On average this sounds like this recipe lasts about 6 months. So, you should be good at least 3 months I would think!

Just want to add a couple tips – u can add 1-3Tbsp. of a pure essential oil for fragrance… lemon or lavender are faves. Also in Canada here, I’ve never seen any of those bar soaps either, what I used was Sunlight. (found in the laundry detergent aisle of walmart.)

I was very anxious to try this but had just bought a 22 lb container that I couldn’t wait for it to run out. In the mean time I tried the Purex Crystals (purple bottle) and loved it. Finally, the day before yesterday my detergent ran out…of to Walmart I went. First, I paid almost $35 including tax. All the ingredients were right next to each other except for the Purex Crystals, which I walked down the aisle for…everything so conveniently waiting for me lol. Also, my son & hubby chose the blue bottle instead of the purple one. We love freshly washed clothes with a soft scent. Secondly, mixing the ingredients was fairly easy. I used that same 22 lb container lined with a plastic bag just as suggested. When I mixed the first few ingredients I pulled the bag out and rolled it around the floor making sure I held the opening tight to mix all the ingredients. Grating the soap was the hardest…well you need a little elbow grease if you don’t have a food processor. After, adding the crystals the bag was just to heavy to pick up…I used a regular kitchen bag but you definitely need a real trash bag…the ingredients are too heavy. At the end I used my hand to finish mixing everything. I was so excited to use the soap I started doing laundry early in the morning. I was very surprised how far 2 tbsps go…it removed grease from my hubby’s work sweater…yay! The clothes smells soooo good too. The scent is not overwhelming, it’s just right! Best part, when I walk in the bedrooms…all I smell is my newly homemade soap….i ABSOLUTELY, love it! Thank you for sharing this…one final thing, this will definitely last a lot longer than the store bought detergents. I will most certainly make this again, whenever its done. Its worth all the money you spend.Thank you, Thank you!

We’ve been using this same recipe for the past two years and LOVE it! We cut the bar soaps into 6 or 8 squares and then microwave t
hem in a safe dish for about a miinute. The squares will puff up quite a bit. They will be very light. Once cooled, place in a food processor and run until the puffed pieces resemble grains of sand. You can then add the other ingredients to the processor, including the Purex crystals, to mix it all or you can mix by hand in your container. No need for cheese graters or elbow grease

I love this idea, but I just went to order the ingredients off amazon (minus the bucket and jar) and it is almost $70, not $20. Should I be looking other places? i’m sure it will still be a deal, but want to make sure I get the best price. Thanks for sharing this great idea!

I’ve made this laundry soap before, and it works very well! I omitted the softener crystals because softener in the water is bad for my septic drain field, and I used Dollar Tree Awesome oxygen powder instead of oxyclean because it’s cheaper. Worked very well. I’ve tried both oxyclean and dollar tree oxy cleaner, and both worked equally well. Good stuff!